The Handbook of Knowledge-Based Coaching: FROM THEORY TO PRACTICE

THE BROADEN-AND-BUILD THEORY AND BARBARA FREDRICKSON

Until recently, researchers were unaware of the extent to which positive emotions are an integral component of our success and well-being. Barbara Fredrickson’s broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions (Fredrickson, 2004; Fredrickson, Tugade, Waugh, & Larkin, 2003) posits that the experience of positive emotions broadens people’s momentary thought-action repertoires, which in turn serves to build their enduring personal resources, ranging from the physical and intellectual to the social and psychological. Fredrickson’s findings suggest that the capacity to experience positive emotions may be a fundamental human strength central to the study of human flourishing. Fredrickson and Losada ...